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Recognizing a problem

If one is up at nearly 2am on a Sunday night merrily debugging various server issues that really can wait a few hours (the few hours I need of sleep) I would think that is a big, flashing sign of an issue. With bright colors and blinking lightbulbs around it.

I admit it, I have a problem. If I see an issue I can't walk by it.. I have to roll up my sleeves and dig in (well, not in a physical sense, of course) no matter how useless that may be at the time (face it, if a server is throwing i/o errors one after another it may be a bit late to try and figure out if I have a current backup). It's not that I'm a workaholic, really, I'm not.. I haven't spent all of today working at all... it's just that I can't walk past something like this. Help.

Posted by kasia on January 19, 2004 01:54 AM |

Comments

I think it is a programmer's natural instinct to try and solve problems, hell, that is why most of us are programmers.

Posted by: Sam | January 19, 2004 04:54 AM

The first stage is recognizing you have a problem.

Posted by: Ben Langhinrichs | January 19, 2004 09:39 AM

Congratulations, you're a sysadmin. There's nothing to do for it but try and escape from computers entirely.

Posted by: Karl Ramm | January 19, 2004 11:07 AM

Hey Kasia..you're not alone. When something breaks around me, I find myself staying up to 5 in the morning fixing it. I don't fall asleep either. Maybe three hours later, I feel woozy and fall to the ground in a heap asleep..I don't see it as a problem, but rather an intensive hobby that keeps my mind sharp. I guess its the sastifaction of seeing it fixed and stuff working that makes me happy.

Oh well, get that much needed rest, and cold pack for those dark circles.

Posted by: david | January 19, 2004 05:20 PM

Yeah, I definitely wouldn't worry about this. When I have a programming problem that I'm working on, I tend to stay up late as well... even when I have school the next day. If it's interfering with other things that *really* need to get done, then just try to convince yourself that it can wait.

Posted by: Tom | February 14, 2004 06:32 PM